(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to an information processing system which receives notice information supplied via a network and displays the notice information, and more particularly to an information processing system in which people with an eyesight disorder can easily access the notice information.
(2) Description of the Related Art
Information processing systems connected to a network, such as an internet or an intranet, have recently become popular. In such information processing systems, processes are provided for receiving notice information from a server connected to the network and for displaying the notice information on a display screen. It is necessary to form such information processing systems so that people with an eyesight disorder can also access the notice information easily.
At present, an exclusive WWW browser is needed to access a home page on a WWW (World Wide Web) in the network to read information published on the home page.
However, in many kinds of WWW browsers, display and operations based on a GUI (Graphical User Interface) are adopted. As a result, it is impossible or extremely difficult for people with an eyesight disorder to access the information on the home page on the WWW.
Thus, for people with an eyesight disorder, a browser which is operated based on combined text and voice output software is provided so that the notice information can be accessed. Concretely, in accordance with the following three methods, a home page on the WWW can be accessed.
(1) Method Using Browser Based on Text
(a) Method Using Text Browser on Unix
A personal computer is connected to a UNIX server by TELNET and a text browser for the WWW is operated from the personal computer in a line mode. Displayed characters are then read out using the voice output software.
(b) Method Using Text Browser of MS-DOS
Using the text browser of the personal computer, the personal computer is connected to the internet in accordance with the TCP-IP protocol. In the line mode, displayed characters are read out using the voice output software.
(2) Method Using WWW Accessing Function of Personal Computer Communication
A personal computer is connected to a host of a personal computer communication which supplies a display service for home pages based on text, displayed characters are read out using the voice output software.
In a case where information on WWW pages can be heard using the text browser as in the conventional case, the user must operate two individual kinds of software: the text browser and the voice output software.
That is, as shown in FIG. 1, the user specifies a URL (Uniform Resource Locator) which is an address of a WWW page on the network and issues a request for displaying data to the text browser. The WWW page is thus displayed on the screen using the text browser. Next, the user must issue a request for outputting information on the WWW page displayed on the screen by voice.
In addition, in a case where information pages can be heard by connecting to the host of the personal computer communication of the display service for the home pages may be supplied based on the text as in the conventional case. However, the user must perform an operation for connecting a personal computer to such a host of the personal computer communication.
Further, in the conventional case, since only displayed characters are read out, information which is not displayed on the screen is not read out. That is, in a case where link information indicates an address of another WWW page included in contents of the WWW page, the link information is not read out. Thus, in this case, people with an eyesight disorder can not recognize the link information coupling the contents of the WWW displayed on the screen to another WWW page.
In the conventional case, the WWW page is displayed on the screen using a text browser having no function for enlarging characters. It is hard for persons with weak eye sight and older persons to recognize notice information displayed on the screen.